In the Zen tradition, to be non-attached is not to stop wanting that which we want. It's to be the witness to our wanting, to be the open space that allows wanting to come and go like clouds. The paradox is that in non-attachment, we become more than less engaged because we then identify with the whole. Being witness dissolves our sense of separateness from the whole. There is no longer a separate I wanting a separate it. As Zen teacher and innovator Alan Watts would say, perfect action then arises from the intelligence of the whole.
